Students at Sinclair Community College don’t need to check their bags in order to take part in the many incentives its Campus Bookstore has to offer.
The bookstore has many alternatives to the traditional book buying experience available to students. These options range from the recently added ability of renting books to growing trend of online purchasing.
Ron Bultema, manager of the bookstore, said that he sees the “combination as part of the process in trying to achieve a lower cost for students.” The newest of these incentives is the ability to rent textbooks.
“We have begun renting books… this past fall we have rented four different titles, and we have expanded it a few more titles for winter quarter,” Bultema said.
With rentals costing about 45 percent the price of a new book, Bultema said he definitely views them as a beneficial opportunity of expansion for students. Rentals can be returned at no extra cost with the same general guidelines as a buy back book.
“Students have the full quarter and can use it as if it was their own book; in terms of light highlighting and reasonable usage,” Bultema said.
Rental books are not the only alternative to the traditional textbooks that students can take advantage of.
“The bookstore is currently up to 150 titles of eBooks and will continue to add significantly more,” Bultema said.
Most eBooks are available for 180 days and for about half the price of a new book, but the benefits don’t stop there, according to Bultema.
“EBooks are downloadable to a student’s computer or can be left on the website, which will give the student access to the book anywhere they have Internet access,” Bultema said.
For the student that prefers the touch of paper and the cash in their pocket from buy backs at the end of the quarter, the bookstore also offers the online purchase of actual textbooks. Students can access the bookstore’s website through the Sinclair home page and from there they have the ability to purchase all the same titles that are available on campus. The textbooks can be purchased using financial aid or credit care, and students have the option to have them shipped to their homes, the bookstore or to any of the learning centers.
“The web has always been there and we’re seeing it grow by leaps and bounds,” Bultema said. “We’ve seen a 23 percent increase in web orders this fall over fall of 2009, and we see that continuing to grow.”
The bookstore’s effort to reach students online extends beyond the .edu realm. They also access students from posts on Sinclair’s Facebook and Twitter accounts. You can find their account on Facebook by searching “Sinclair Community College” and Twitter by searching “SinclairCC.”
“We have run promotions on Facebook (in the past) and we’re looking into more promotions on the web coming for the winter… so stay tuned,” Bultema said.